How to make every mobile moment a brand-builder?

Mobile marketing arena is rapidly turning into from ‘terra incognita’ to well-researched area. Most of latest studies carried out by Google show predictable results: customers are looking for speedy and easy mobile experience on their fingertips. However, most of marketers fail to consider the fact that a neutral ‘3-star’ experience is almost equal to negative one, when it comes to mobile.

The concept of micro-moments was introduced by Google in 2015 to give a name to certain types of customer behavior that became prevalent due to widespread mobile use. The company picked out most common moments, where customers wanted to know, go, do and buy and researched their behavior trends, motivation and action sequence.

This concept can be applied to customer journey mapping and analyzing customer steps on the way to end-product or service. The fewer steps are necessary to reach the goal, and the higher communication quality every step implies, the higher chance mobile moments work on brand-building.

A routine case: a customer wants to order and buy your product.

In the process of creating a mobile app, our specialists analyze the possible customer behavior and divide this process into micro-steps and motivations.

Each of them is considered either to add value or to add expenses to all parties involved.

Customers spend more time and efforts on a purchase and the chance of getting an abandoned shopping cart is higher with each unnecessary step.

84% of businesses included data-driven approaches to learn more about mobile moments. However, only half of responded marketers said they ‘deliver the seamless brand experience’. A study by Forrester

This article is going to tell more on how to make each micro-moment in a mobile application better optimized for the customer needs and interests and valuable to both parties.

When it comes to mobile app experience, there are two primary aspects to increase a chance of turning mobile moments into brand-building: speed and relevance of solutions offered. If you cannot provide these two, sad news to you.

It’s a clever idea to invest in primary class mobile development services focusing on flawless product performance in addition to content and design.
In the process of shaping the digital transformation of the company and continuing configuration of the digital ecosystem, it is vital to use lean production approach and work with companies that do.

How lean production can be used to make every mobile moment a brand-builder?

To create valuable customer experience, it is necessary to consider the lean supply. It can help add value to the product and avoid losses in every single mobile moment, i.e. customers don’t have to make unnecessary steps on their way to the final product or service.

For example, let’s consider the checkout stage and learn from most common mistakes marketers and developers make. Such moments may seem inconspicuous from the first sight, but they add no value – it means, add expenses and may lead to decreased ROI.

Checkout process: brand-building and brand-killing moments

To sign up or not to sign up?

Baymard Institute Research states that creating new accounts is a problem for many people, as they forget their logins and passwords or don’t want to waste their time. In many cases it is easier to abandon the purchase and go to competitors than to fill out registration forms.

Solution: Provide a “guest shopping” option and make sure it is visible.

Omnichannel shopping

In one of our articles, we said about MasterCard research: omnichannel customers spend around 250% more than single-channel shoppers. Some people choose to start shopping on mobile and continue on PC or pick up the ordered product at the brick-and-mortar store.

Solution: Support omnichannel shopping by adding an option to save the cart or send it per email, add a “save for later” button. VALFOR company suggests adding the following functions to promote omnichannel purchases:

multi-level work with abandoned carts,

application for products out of stock now,

in-store QR or bar code scanning to add product to favorites

Coupons: a brand-building or a brand-killing tool?

Coupons go well for building brand loyalty, but adding a discount code field at the checkout is the most common fail in the history of e-commerce. Why so? Kissmetrics blog states: this little box makes an average user start wondering, if there are cheaper ways to buy this product. The app or the mobile website is abandoned, and this customer ends up looking for discounts on the Internet or (even worse) looking for product alternatives.

Solution: Do not distract your potential buyers at the final stage of the purchasing process. It is much better to place discounts on separate screens.

“Quick buy” button

A one-click purchase is a perfect scenario both for brands and their customers. Such a supply chain would be as lean as possible, so do not miss this opportunity and consider adding a “quick buy” button for returning customers.

Solution: Automatic redirection to the next screen after the form is filled out, saved delivery address and payment data can simplify mobile experience a lot.

More tips on UI and UX:

User-friendly forms increase conversions. Nobody really enjoys filling them out, however, they are necessary. Make the process easier by using auto-suggestions and auto-completions or use Google’s geolocation search.

Use ‘mobile first’ approach. Design for small screens instead of scaling down the desktop version. The latter won’t fit the average thumb or index finger width and implies using a mouse anyway. Otherwise – a few wrong clicks and the angry customer is not likely to reach the checkout.

Minimum dropdown lists. If it is impossible to display all choices and you have to create a dropdown list, make sure you include a search option and show most popular variants first.

To make mobile moments brand-building, you should keep in mind that customers value high speed, flawless and extensive functionality, and attractive design as well as assistance, relevant content and clear navigation with no unnecessary steps.

VALFOR Company works to identify most common scenarios and analyzes the value of brand-customer communication at every single micro-moment. We create a plan and do our best to optimize the steps. Our partners can be sure their customers don’t have to perform extra actions on their way to purchase.

How your business can win in mobile moments?

One of the ways businesses can transform mobile moments into brand-building activities is to use habit-forming technology when rethinking company marketing.

When it comes to forming habits, the first thing that comes to mind is a popular Hook Model suggested by Nir Eyal in his book “Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products”. This model reflects is the process of building habitual consumption of goods and services for building a stronger brand, increasing customer lifetime value, using competitive advantage and being flexible in pricing.

Here is the way this model can be implemented when creating a digital product to increase value:

External trigger – for example, app promotion in the media, advertising in-store (at the point of sales), welcoming bonuses for installation.

Investment – referral program, product reviews to feel their own value and expertise, information about earned points and bonuses, exclusive offers, differentiated discounts by the day of the week.

The next round can start from the combination of external (segmented push-notifications, emails) and internal (desire to start the app looking for loyalty program bonuses or weekly discounts) triggers.

Summary

The most powerful way to build a brand via mobile moments is to model your customer’s journey and improve is as much as you can. Figure out, what people want and – most important – don’t want.

Ask yourself what is the most valuable step you want your perfect customer to take in the process of mobile communication with your brand? Do you want them to call you? Do you want them to buy from your online store or just place an order and then pay for it and receive it at your brick-and-mortar store? Maybe your goal is to increase brand awareness?

Take a step back and try walking in your customer’s shoes. What are the marketing touch points? Make all of them mobile-friendly and remove unnecessary losses to improve value.

Finally, every step you customer takes to reach the product can be a brand builder. In a situation when customer’s pronounced loyalty to the brand drops, and the opportunity to buy from other sellers appears, long-term investment in brand-building pays off. The customer should have a clear idea on their mind: “I can buy the product at X quickly and easily”. Such a mindset is created by tiny moments and brand-building details. This is the reason, why they must never be neglected. Brand is a perception.